Features:

Tracks of the Year 2017

2017 has been kind to us with a year that has included some of the finest albums of the last few years alongside some of the most exciting emerging bands for some time. We’ve scoured our features, playlists and issues from the last twelve months to pick our favourite songs. We have a winner and in no particular order, we have our runners up.

RUNNERS UP

Sorry – Lies

Plucking at guitar strings as if they are open nerves, it’s with this kind of emotional vulnerability that Sorry invite us to explore audio-visually which sets them apart, and high above, the rest. They refuse to let their audience be anonymous auditors as they coerce us into their world through more than just music but raw poetry and technological temperamentality. The sound of ‘Lies’ is the sound lying: dissonant, problematic, toxic, sweet and duplicitous – Georgie Jesson

The Moonlandingz – The Strangle of Anna

The success of The Moonlandingz in 2017 has been one of the stranger tales of the year, as the semi-fictional band released their fantastic album ‘Interplanetary Class Classics’ to widespread critical and commercial success. However, it is “The Strangle of Anna” featuring Rebecca Taylor of Slow Club that stands out, as a gloriously bizarre heroin-pop duet that is both beautiful and repulsive in equal measure. – Dan Pare

The Magic Gang – How Can I Compete

Why are we still waiting for a bloody Magic Gang album?! Thats the true question but the Brighton quartet have been teasing us with the release of their third EP this year which included the magnificent How Can I Compete?, a bouncing bass line that The Magic Gang have come to master is accompanied by the bands trademark feel good indie pop. Simple but affective, The Magic Gang motto and it works beautifully every time. - Callum McCormack

Wolf Alice – Don’t Delete The Kisses

At the North Londoners’ Ally Pally victory lap, Wolf Alice once again demonstrated why they are destined to headline the world’s biggest festivals. In front of 10,000 fans, they played ‘Don’t Delete The Kisses’ under a suitably gigantic disco ball. It’s a euphoric, brazen love song and it’s one of their finest. – Emma Snook

Dead Pretties- Confidence

Complete with thudding bassline, guttural howling, and an unavoidable energy that pierces the soul as much as the eardrums, ‘Confidence’ is a track of such feral animation that it seems destined to hold longevity, even as the band is no longer. RIP Dead Pretties, you will be missed. – Dan Pare

Shame – One Rizla

Shame have used 2017 to make the next step, signing to Dead Oceans and working towards their debut record ‘Songs of Praise’. The band have toured relentlessly this year, accepting that their strengths lie in live performance but amongst the shows they’ve managed to squeeze in the release on Indie gem titled ‘One Rizla’. A track which boasts the honesty, catchiness and anger that is culpable for where they are today. Solid video too. – Sam Ford

Childhood – Californian Light

Ben Romans Hopcraft, frontman of Childhood and member of Warmduscher and Insecure Men has had a busy year. Whilst 2018 may be the year for the latter two bands, this year certainly belonged to comeback kings, Childhood. Returning with a stunning second record, a record of which you didnt realise you needed until you heard it. Lead single from the album was ‘Californian Light’, a love letter to London and a perfect summer soundtrack. Having the band play our festival at The Old Blue Last will live long in the memory.

The Rhythm Method – Something For The Weekend

While obvious comparisons will be drawn with noughties cult heroes The Streets, The Rhythm Method provide us with sexy guitar riffs intertwined with some of the best lyrical work this year. Something For The Weekend sees the London duo exclaiming to the world the everyday mans social troubles.

AND THE WINNER IS…

Baxter Dury – Miami

Miami is the crowning jewel in Baxter Dury’s magnum opus; the marriage of a rumbling bassline, beautiful Gainsbourgesque strings and the deadpan delivery of the cockney poet, it’s one of the sassiest and classiest albums of the year. A ballad to narcissism, Baxter proclaims himself “the sausage man… the glassy dude” among other bizarre nicknames. - Cal Cashin